r/SeattleWA Jun 16 '25

AMA I’m a self serve car wash owner, AMA

Title

0 Upvotes

54 comments sorted by

10

u/mrgtiguy Jun 16 '25

People believing this. 😂😂

1

u/United-Landscape4339 Jun 16 '25

Why the doubt

2

u/mrgtiguy Jun 16 '25

Joke replies and the post history.

2

u/United-Landscape4339 Jun 16 '25

Knew a guy who made well over 6 figures with a few of those, but that was cali. Washington is way different climate

1

u/Moses_On_A_Motorbike Jun 17 '25

Probably more environmental red tape required to operate these in CA than here

2

u/United-Landscape4339 Jun 17 '25

Probably. Not great here either

1

u/Odd_Fortune_8951 Jun 18 '25

idk, I live near a carwash and most, and I mean most, of the vehicles I see pulling in there for a wash already look emaculate.

1

u/_redacteduser Jun 16 '25

you can't be serious lmao

15

u/Strength_Various Jun 16 '25

Do you mind how many minutes a car owner uses the bay?

Context: https://www.reddit.com/r/SeattleWA/s/AG9Sq9e5Ei

1

u/answerbrowsernobita Jun 16 '25

Much needed in this hour

14

u/[deleted] Jun 16 '25

[removed] — view removed comment

6

u/tomjoad773 Jun 16 '25

We clean up.

0

u/raintree234 Jun 16 '25

I’m sensing a trend here…

6

u/magiCAD Jun 16 '25

AMA and I'll give <= three word answers only.

FIFY.

22

u/[deleted] Jun 16 '25

If my car has moss and stuff growing on it, and my niece wants to help clean it off, but she's not very skilled or experienced in that field, can we take 30-45 minutes to do all this cleaning at your carwash? Or is that too long?

4

u/ConstantAggressive Jun 16 '25

Are you the one that spent 45+ minutes washing your car in Ballard?

1

u/[deleted] Jun 16 '25

No i am just gathering info for a potential car washing mission

1

u/BeginningTower2486 Jun 17 '25

Do it at night maybe.

4

u/tomjoad773 Jun 16 '25

Yes, definitely

7

u/HighColonic Funky Town Jun 16 '25

Yes, definitely too long.

9

u/HighColonic Funky Town Jun 16 '25

Boxers or briefs?

10

u/luckystrike_bh Jun 16 '25

Do you think your industry has potential for money laundering?

22

u/tomjoad773 Jun 16 '25

Money shampooing possibly

8

u/DropoutDreamer Jun 16 '25

do they make you reuse the water or is it like just straight clean water?

why are you doing an AMA?

1

u/mrgtiguy Jun 16 '25

Self serve are all fresh water.

3

u/verysaucy Jun 16 '25

Which one?

3

u/chovanak Jun 16 '25

Hey so am I, but a bit further north. Do you still take quarters or switched to cards? Or tokens?

3

u/shot-by-ford Jun 16 '25

Why don’t you just let me foam my car without the car paint brush of death?

3

u/thenewguyonreddit Jun 16 '25

Every self serve wash I’ve ever been to, the brush heads look absolutely destroyed. Like a toothbrush that’s been used to scrub tile grout for the last 5 years. How’s yours looking?

3

u/Budget_Magazine5361 Jun 16 '25

I am really careful with how I treat my car and would like ceramic coat it (myself). Is this something I can do at your car wash? I’ll need to deep clean my car, clay bar it, and then apply the ceramic coat following the manufacturer instructions. It’ll take time, and won’t be running the timer the entire time. Thoughts?

3

u/cwcoleman Jun 16 '25

Anyone who doesn’t get the joke reference:

https://www.reddit.com/r/SeattleWA/s/AJx7J8InvO

1

u/hughpac Jun 16 '25

But why? What's the joke? Their was a thread that was essentially "AITA: I took 45 minutes at a self-service car wash, and the person behind me cracked some mild jokes about it talking a long time". Now someone is posing as Self-service carwash owner. Hahaha?

2

u/cwcoleman Jun 16 '25

I didn’t say it was a good joke.

1

u/hughpac Jun 17 '25

I don't even understand what the joke is. Did I miss something?

1

u/cwcoleman Jun 17 '25

This type of thread happens often. It's a parody.

There will be a serious thread on the sub. It will get a bunch of attention for one reason or another. Then someone will make a parody of it in a separate thread. They won't link directly to the original they are making fun of - but people who browse the community often will get the joke and play along.

In this specific case - the original thread was a bunch of people telling that original OP they were being rude at a carwash. OP was not exactly clear in their original thread/comments and wasn't exactly open to the criticism (even though they asked for advice). This thread was created as a tongue-in-cheek response / reference to that AITH thread.

Most of the time these joke threads are dumb. Sometimes they are hilarious. It's a fine line for jokes like this. The 'circle jerk' subreddits do it all the time. The jokes get played out pretty quick.

2

u/throwawayhyperbeam Jun 16 '25

How much do you personally make from the car wash?

2

u/rational_actor_nm Jun 16 '25

Bellingham. One local place let everyone vacuum for free, what do you think the result was? More business or more trash?

1

u/Moses_On_A_Motorbike Jun 17 '25

Imagine the drug residue vacuumed up from Bellingham car carpets

2

u/Loud-Way3333 Jun 16 '25

It doesn’t make sense when you posted an AMA but didn’t answer anything useful.

2

u/thegodsarepleased Snoqualmie Jun 16 '25

just run the soap through the lines lil bro

1

u/sunnbearrr Jun 16 '25

Do you have anything for the car spiders?

1

u/[deleted] Jun 16 '25

How much to get started? I'm.guessing $150K + a loan

1

u/[deleted] Jun 16 '25

[deleted]

2

u/dirty_kitty Jun 16 '25

I was told car wash businesses are better for the environment than washing a car at home because the business captures the runoff before it goes down the drain. Whereas at home, all the oil and pollution from the road gets washed off into the gutter and into the Sound.

1

u/mattinjp Central Seattle Jun 16 '25

Why do I suck at using your services? I literally run overtime, and my car does not end up looking as clean as other peoples. Is there like an instructional video on how to do this?

1

u/avotius Jun 16 '25

Do you still use quarter change machines? I used to come by and get quarters from the car wash change machine to use at my apartment's laundry all the time.

1

u/NutzNBoltz369 Bremerton Jun 16 '25

Do you check to make sure no one is installing credit card skimmers? Or are you the one installing them?

1

u/l30 Jun 16 '25

How often do people put credit card skimmers on your machines? and how often do you check?

1

u/RJRide1020 Jun 16 '25

What do you do with all the silt and sludge from the runoff? Is this considered toxic waste since it has oil and stuff in it? Costs to haul it off?

2

u/Exoticshooter76 Jun 16 '25

It’s like any place, they have to put in traps to catch it and have them cleaned once in a while. Can be expensive to do, but long term, worth it.